By the Rev. W. H. Jones. 



293 



founded in this church, as early as 1299, in honor of the Blessed 

 Virgin. A beam in the oaken roof of the western end of the north 

 aisle has, carved upon it, i Jesus Maria/ which, if in its original 

 position, might serve to indicate the especial portion of the church 

 set apart for this chantry. The chantry priest at the time of the 

 Reformation was one Richard Casemore, of whom the commissioners 

 reported as follows : — " The said incumbent is a very honest man, 

 reputed amongst his neighbours, and not able to serve a cure ; albeit 

 he is a very poore man and hath none other living but this chauntre 

 only." 1 



Of the tithings of Tisbury, West Hatch and Chicksgrove have 

 some interest for us ; the former, from having belonged to Lawrence 

 Hyde, the grandfather of the great Lord Clarendon, — and the latter, 

 from having been the birth-place of Sir John Davies, Attorney- 

 General for Ireland, who died in 1626, a few days after he had 

 been raised to the dignity of Chief Justice of the King's Bench. 

 In Tisbury Church is the brass that marks the last resting-place of 

 Lawrence Hyde, an engraving of which is given in Mr. E. Kite's 

 volume of the ' Brasses of Wilts.' Sir John Davies's most lasting 

 monument is to be found in those poems which he wrote 

 on the ' Immortality of the Soul,' and on the ' Dignity of Man.' 

 What more worthy epitaph could he have desired than the following 

 beautiful description of the soul's ceaseless panting for eternity : 

 [Sect, xxx.] 



" At first her mother earth she holdeth dear, 

 And doth embrace the world and worldly things ; 

 She flies close by the ground, and hovers here, 

 And mounts not up with her celestial wings. 



Yet under heaven she cannot light on aught 

 That with her heav'nly nature doth agree ; 

 She cannot rest, she cannot fix her thought, 

 She cannot,, in this world, contented be. 



So, when the Soul finds here no true content, 

 And, like Noah's dove, can no sure footing take, 

 She doth return from whence she first was sent, 

 And flies to Him that first her wings did make." 



1 ' Certificates of Chauntreys,' &c, now in the Public Record Office. Certif. 56, 

 No. 13.— Certif. 58, No. 22.— Certif. 59, No. 13. 



VOL. VII. — JtfO. XXI. 2 D 



